A Carlisle guest house has been crowned the best B&B of the week in Channel 4’s popular reality TV show Four in a Bed.
Abbey Court Guest House, owned by Kelly Heslop and David Pattinson, took part in the show. Kelly appeared with her mum Lorraine and impressed their guests from B&Bs across the country and took home the grand prize and winner’s plaque at the end of their week on screen.
In the programme, four B&B owners open their doors to guests and take turns to stay with each other, as they compete to be crowned best hosts.
Talking about her big win, Kelly said: “It was great to be judged by your peers and it felt absolutely fantastic to win. I didn’t expect to but I actually got very emotional from having such positive feedback. It was quite a shock to win especially when the other places were fantastic. We felt very humbled by it I suppose.”
Kelly said she had been regularly approached by the show runners for years before she finally decided to appear after making big renovations to the guest house.
She added she was apprehensive about starring on the show at first, but said she was inspired by the outcome of her renovations to go for it.
Kelly said: “When we got the guest house it needed a lot of work, but we used to get contacted quite regularly to come on the show. We always used to say no way, we are not going to go on it and we were very against it, mainly worried about how we might be portrayed.
“But when we renovated we were super happy with the results and when we got another email from them I thought, let’s just do it.”
She added being part of the show had been an overall positive experience for her and her mum and that it was a good opportunity to invite other people into their world to see what they do.
Kelly said: “It was really good fun, we filmed from 8pm to 11pm at night and you were always doing different things so it was quite tiring but everyone was really nice. We’re actually all still in contact now and It was lovely hanging out with my mum and the new people we met, it was just a really fun thing to do.”
Upon arrival at the Carlisle guest house, the other teams commented on how nice the building’s exterior paint job was and called the rooms gorgeous and the beds cosy and comfortable.
For their daytime activity, Kelly and Lorraine took their guests out into the countryside, where they went abseiling. In the evening, the guests headed to the pub and around the breakfast table the following morning, the guests had lots of praise for Kelly’s breakfast.
The duo only dropped a few marks in comparison to the other couples, and all the guests paid the full amount for their stay in the Carlisle guest house, calling it very well deserved.
Kelly’s close friend, Sharron Taylor, who helped with the rebranding of the B&B, said: “Once everything for filming had been given the go ahead she let me know what was going on and we all just went into overdrive to get set up and get everything cleaned and ready.
“It was really exciting watching them film, you didn’t want to say the wrong thing but you were also trying to be nosey at the same time. It was a really fun atmosphere.
“Kelly and Lorraine just loved it and they came back absolutely buzzing, we were all just on cloud nine. Kelly is literally superwoman, she does the breakfast, the bookings, the cleaning, the ironing, she is switched on 24/7 and I think for her to get that award, it was just the biggest confirmation that it’s all worth it.”
